Pitch Invaders

At the end of Manchester City’s 5-1 thrashing of AC Milan in the International Champions Cup match in Pittsburgh, two fans ran onto the field to take a selfie with Mario Balotelli. This became the most recent occurrence of what seems to be a growing trend in soccer now. At Real Madrid’s unveiling of their new £60 million signing James Rodriguez (which may have been a bit much), a fan wearing a Colombian jersey found his way past security to hug the World Cup star. This past World Cup had no shortage of pitch invaders running onto the field for various reasons. Perhaps most memorably however, was a couple months ago, when one fan #DaredToZlatan by running onto the field to give Ibrahimovic a hug and was rewarded with his jersey.

In most of these events, the fans were bold enough to break through the boundaries and were compensated with a special moment with their soccer idols. I think it’s great that some of the biggest names in soccer had enough sense to not overreact in these situations, though I wouldn't blame them for losing their cool. It’s become worryingly easy to run onto the field past security, and interact with the players directly. I’d like to believe that in all cases, these fans have good intentions, but it’s really impossible to make that distinction. I’m glad that we’re not overreacting to most of these situations, some of which can even be adorable, but at some point security has to be stepped up. I mean, it shouldn't be up to other fans to deal with these guys.